His eyes focused on the clock sitting on the kitchen counter. His self-imposed countdown had forty-five minutes left. Forty-five minutes until the suffering would be over and he would find her again in the darkness.

Michael wasn’t sure exactly why he was waiting. There was no doubt in his mind that Operations was going to order Nikita’s cancellation. But he felt, in some odd way, that he owed it to her to wait through these last hours. Even if he couldn’t be with her, he would have six more hours of pain to atone for all his sins.

He had contemplated those sins while sitting in the gathering darkness. The innocents that had died as a result of his bombs. Those he had betrayed. A sister who had grown and cried and married without her brother. Rene, who had been like a brother to him. Lonely women like Lisa and Andrea he had been forced to seduce because of their importance to Section. Walter and Birkoff, who would no doubt hold him responsible for Nikita’s death again.

Nikita…

For a moment, the pain threatened to overcome him, but he shoved it back down into the silence. His eyes flickered to the clock. Thirty-six minutes, he told the demons. Thirty-six more minutes and I am yours.

Would she understand why he wasn’t with her? Did she even want him near, after his betrayal of her? He had kissed her in Section, and he had felt her shudder. Had it been regret or revulsion? Which did he prefer? The kiss had been his farewell. Not an au revoir —"until I see you again," but an adieu —"to God." A final farewell before he had walked away from her for the last time. He hoped that she hated him for what he had done. Better that she hate him than for her to find out now that he loved her, when he had not been able to save her despite his efforts.

Why hadn’t she run? He understood why she had resisted his entreaties to betray Adrian. He even understood why she had insisted on coming back to Section after Adrian’s capture. She had wanted to face the woman she had deceived. How like Nikita to feel guilty for saving the lives of everyone in Section, in addition to countless other lives. But when he had asked, begged her to run before they came to cancel her, she had refused. And in that moment, the demons began their clamoring.

He picked up the gun, caressing it. He held it to the side of his face, felt the cold metal against his skin. How fitting that it would be the only attendant at his death. After all, he had died years ago, both officially and emotionally. Now I can finish what should have been ended long before now. He contemplated the gun for a moment more and then placed it back on the table.

************

At fourteen minutes, Michael lifted his head at the sound of a key in the lock. The knob turned, the door opened, and his heart stopped beating.

Nikita took two steps into her dim apartment and stopped when she sensed a figure in the shadows.

"Michael?" she whispered. It had to be him.

Her eyes focused and she could make out a silhouette sitting on her couch. "Michael?" she whispered again. He made no answer. She walked toward him and gently sat down next to him. He was staring at her and staring through her at the same time. Troubled, she lifted her hand to cup the side of his face, but pulled away as he jerked violently at her touch.

"Why are you here?" he whispered hoarsely.

"I don’t understand," she replied confusedly. "Michael, we’re in my apartment." The vacant horror in his eyes disturbed her. With a jerky motion, he grabbed her arms and dug his fingers into her.

"Why did they send you here? Do they want me to cancel you?"

And then she understood the horror, and her heart broke for his pain.

"They’re not going to cancel me. Madeline called me into her office about an hour ago and told me to go home."

"What?" He stared at her. "Nikita, that doesn’t make any sense. Why would they let you go?" He was afraid to believe, afraid that it was a hallucination or some cruel trap.

"I don’t know why. She didn’t explain anything. She just told me to go home and that I would probably be called in for a mission within a few days." Nikita risked a glance at Michael. He still looked haunted. "So I left," she concluded.

He closed his eyes, and she could see him shutting down in front of her.

"Michael." No response. "Michael, you’re hurting me."

He realized that he was still gripping her arms. He pried his fingers open and was appalled to see the white impressions his fingers had left on her skin.

"Of course I’m hurting you."

She barely had time to gasp at the self-hatred in his eyes before he was moving, rising quickly and beginning to walk away. Her words chased after him as he reached the door.

"Why are you here?"

He stopped, but didn’t answer.

"Why is your gun sitting on my table?"

She stood and walked to stand by him. Placing a hand on his arm, she was not surprised to discover than he was rock hard with tension. She urged him to turn towards her, and he pivoted, leaning back against the closed door, eyes shut.

"You were going to shoot yourself?" she asked in disbelief.

Her incomprehension increased when he slid slowly down the door to come to a sitting position on the floor. She quickly bent down and crouched in front of him.

"Michael, please say something."

Instead, he reached out, grabbed both her arms, and tugged her toward him. Thrown off balance, she fell into his arms, which closed about her in a fierce, desperate embrace. His breath shuddered out of his lungs, and he simply held her, rocking back and forth.

Something shattered in Nikita, and she found herself clutching him convulsively, sobbing. They stayed that way for several minutes, until his breathing slowed and her tears stopped. She felt him move, and then his warm breath was on her cheek as he kissed away her tears.

************

Somehow, his kisses had found their way to her mouth. He didn’t know if she had turned her head or if he had unconsciously moved. But it didn’t matter. Gently, he tasted her, feeling a shred of his soul rescued from the darkness each time she touched him. One hand began smoothing up and down her back, while the other slid into her hair and urged her mouth nearer to his. She came willingly, sliding her tongue into his mouth, pausing to murmur his name.

His kisses grew more desperate as he gave into every impulse he had stifled at Section. She would never know how much it had cost him to chastely kiss her cheek, when he had really wanted to show her all the passion he felt before she was taken from him. But now she was back, and she was alive, and he wanted to find his life again in her.

He pulled her more closely into his embrace so that she could feel his need for her. She moaned then and began kissing her way down his jaw to his throat. He needed the contact with her mouth and dragged her mouth back to his, trying desperately to convey everything he felt for her through his kisses—everything he had never been able to tell her, everything he had never said. I will never let them take you from me again, said his kiss. I will protect you, if I have to damn myself to do it.

He moved then, lowering her to the floor and sliding into the cradle of her legs. He looked at her face for a moment, framed by the honey of her hair, shining eyes staring at him expectantly. "I never expected to see you again." She made no response, but instead reached up and caressed his face, slipping her index finger between his lips. He suckled the tip for a moment, nipping the pad of her finger, and then drew her finger deeply into his mouth. She gasped, and the sound tore at him.

He stretched out on top of her, intent on proving to himself that she was real, wanting only to give her pleasure. He returned to kiss her for a moment, licking at her lips, sweeping his tongue across the roof of her mouth. As his lips traced a path down her throat and across her collarbone, he became aware that she was speaking.

"Michael….Michael, I’ve wanted this so much. I wanted to be able to tell you the truth. When you came here, I wanted to tell you everything….Adrian was listening…I had to convince her…"

Michael froze, as the memory of those moments washed over him. He had betrayed her. Given her to Section for slaughter. He had known they would kill her, and he had chosen to bring her in. He rolled off of Nikita and staggered to his feet, intent on escaping the apartment and the demons which had once again started screaming.

Nikita lay on the floor, confused. One moment, Michael had been caressing her and stealing her breath away; the next moment, his warm presence was gone. She sat up and saw him heading for the door again. Reaching out a hand, she grabbed his pant leg.

"Michael! Please don’t leave me."

He halted, expelling a shuddering breath.

"You don’t want me here."

"Michael, of course I want you here. With me. What did I do wrong?"

Still not facing her, he replied bitterly. "You didn’t do anything. It was me. It’s always me."

"Michael, if you haven’t left yet, it’s because you don’t really want to leave. Can we talk about this, please?"

Michael waged a debate with the self-hatred that told him to leave, that he had hurt her too much already. Before he could change his mind, he turned, walked quickly to the couch, and sat down. Meanwhile, Nikita got up and double-bolted the door. She considered turning the lights on, but decided that Michael would probably rather remain in the dark.

She sat down next to him and could feel him shaking ever-so-slightly. She had never seen him like this, not even when Simone died for the second time. He seemed so fragile, like a touch or a misplaced word might shatter him.

"Michael, do you want to start?"

"No," he gasped. "I can’t…please, explain it all to me. I know I have no right to ask you for anything, after all the times I’ve lied to you…"

"No, it’s OK," she said quickly. "I want you to understand."

************

Nikita took a moment to gather her thoughts and then began her narrative.

"You know that Adrian had me kidnapped out of my apartment. It was Carla…" she trailed off, unable to suppress a pang of grief. Carla had been a spy, but Nikita still believed they had been friends, at least on some level.

"Anyway, I won’t say that I didn’t consider helping Adrian. But once she killed our team and almost killed you, I went to Operations."

"Why?"

She sighed deeply. "Several reasons, I guess. Walter told me a bit about her, and he mentioned that fact that Madeline was scared of her. That bothered me. I didn’t trust the fact that she had had me watched for two years." She looked at him almost defiantly. "And I didn’t like her threatening you. If she was so sure that she was right, then she should have been able to convince me to help her without threatening to hurt or kill you."

"You lied to me. You told me you had been taken by L’Heure Sanguine." He found himself growing angry. He had felt so guilty about that. Guilty that his past and his problems had put her in danger. And it had all been a lie. Just like any of the lies you told her, his demons mocked.

Nikita was answering him. "I had to. She said that if I told you anything, you’d be killed. I couldn’t let you be in danger because of me." She waited, expecting a response from him, but he remained silent, waging some inner battle that she vaguely sensed but did not really understand. So she continued.

"Operations and Madeline had been growing suspicious about all the security breaches lately. They already suspected Adrian—her approaching me just confirmed it. They asked me to go under cover, and I agreed."

"Why?" he whispered.

"I’ve already told you why."

"Why wasn’t I told?"

Her expression grew sorrowful. "We couldn’t take the chance, Michael. Adrian knew that you and I were…connected. Would you have behaved the way you did in my apartment if you had known I wasn’t really betraying Section? It needed to be absolutely genuine." She risked touching him then, turning his face towards hers. "She listened to almost everything I did. Every conversation, every meeting…even when she wasn’t feeding me instructions, I couldn’t be sure that she wasn’t listening."

The look in his eyes was still there. "Michael, I don’t understand. You explain it to me. Why would you kill yourself?"

"I thought they would cancel you," he replied. "What you did—challenging Operations like that, forcing him to justify his actions to you…you were signing your own death warrant." His voice rose. "And you made me stand there and watch. Not only that, you held the lives of everyone in Section in your hand. And then you asked me for advice."

"Which you didn’t give me."

"What did you expect me to say? You know I couldn’t make that decision for you. You would have doubted my reasons, no matter what I said. And you would have been right to do so. So many lies…"

"No, Michael…" she began.

"You know I’m right." He raised haunted eyes to meet her glance. "Nikita, you knew that I would betray you to Section. It was part of the mission profile."

"Michael…" How do I explain this to him? "Michael, turning me in to Section made it possible for us to capture Adrian. We knew—I knew—that you would do what was necessary. Do you expect me to be angry at you for choosing the lives of everyone in Section over me?"

************

"Yes," he replied bitterly. "Why shouldn’t you be angry? I betrayed you again."

"You gave me every opportunity you could to escape. You tried desperately to help me. When we were in the kitchen, Michael, you were practically begging me to tell you the truth. I could see how much pain you were in, and it killed me to lie to you like that."

Her words penetrated the haze of self-loathing surrounding his brain. "But I knew they would kill you…" he murmured brokenly.

Nikita desperately wanted to embrace him, to somehow make him see that she did understand what he had done. She settled for placing a hand on his arm.

"You didn’t have a choice. Aside from the fact that you thought you were saving Section—which you were—you were being tested too. If you hadn’t turned me in, they would have known you lied to them and covered for me again." Her fingers tightened on his arm. "At the very least, they would have placed you in abeyance. They probably would have had you cancelled."

"Do you think I care?" he spat out. "You’re the only thing that’s kept me alive these past few years…especially since I found and lost Simone again. I knew I had condemned you to death. Traitors die, Nikita."

"And as far as you knew, I was the traitor," she retorted. "Not you. When are you going to stop punishing yourself for the actions of everyone around you? My God, Michael. What would I have done if I had come back here to find you lying in a pool of blood with the back of your head blown out? Yes, they let me go, but it can’t be that simple. They’ll find some other way to get rid of me, and if I have any chance of surviving, I need you."

"Why?" he asked almost bemusedly. "What have I ever done but hurt you and lie to you?"

"You have kept me alive," she whispered fiercely. "Don’t you dare stop now."

He sat there, unwilling to believe that she could still care for him. Then she pivoted off the sofa and crouched in the floor, on her knees before him.

"Michael, if you die, I die too. It’s that simple."

************

And he believed her. Perhaps it really was that simple. Or perhaps it was because he needed her so badly that he was willing to accept what she said as the truth. Whatever the reason, she had convinced him that she didn’t blame him for his actions. Obtaining forgiveness from his own soul would be a much harder process. But for the moment, he was willing to be content with the fact that they were both still alive, despite everything.

He reached out and covered her hands which lay on his knees.

"Please promise me that you will be here to help me," she whispered.

He released the breath he had been holding for the past six hours. "I promise."

Her head sagged in relief, and she looped her arms behind his knees, pulling her body to his. He threaded his hands into her hair, and gently caressed her scalp. He enjoyed the feel of her for a moment, and then said, "You must be exhausted."

She looked up at him and grinned wryly. "I am."

"Me too," he answered. "Let’s go to bed." He noticed her eyes darkening and spoke quickly. "To sleep," he clarified.

Her face reflected her disappointment, but she knew he was right. She had been operating on adrenaline for the past several days, and she figured he was no better off. She rose to her feet, only to have her breath catch in her chest as he rose at the same time. They stood there, pressed together, until he reached for her and pulled her into his arms.

He spoke so softly she had to strain to hear him, despite their closeness. "Nikita, you are not only the reason I live. You are my life." He surprised her then by taking her mouth in a desperate, hot kiss that left both of them gasping. "And the last thing I want to do in that bed is sleep, but we need the rest if we’re going to keep you alive."

"And you," she replied. "We’re going to keep you alive, too."

He smiled then, and nodded his assent. Backing up, he took her hand and led her into the bedroom. As he climbed the steps, he took a moment to listen. The demons were not gone, but their shouting was oddly silenced by the small, musical sound of hope that had lodged in his soul.

They eased into bed, limbs tangled and hands still clasped. He took comfort in her presence as she did in his, and they both fell into a blessedly dreamless sleep.